a thou Now, ther NO W, THERE’S A THOUGHT!

by Jim Burns

There’s a way to lose our worries

WHAT did we do before satnavs and Google Maps? Well, if you were me, you got lost. Often. Mind you, I can still get lost using navigation systems, but that’s another story.

Recently our church choir sang a hymn with the words: ‘When I’m crying like a lost child in the dead of night,/ Feeling left behind, nowhere to go.’ It reminded me of how I can feel lost when I worry. Perhaps others of us worry too, because of the cost of living, problems with work or a relationship breakdown.

I like the fact that the Bible is honest about how such feelings can be experienced even by people who have put their trust in God. A man who loved God wrote, ‘I am worn out with grief; every night my bed is damp from my weeping; my pillow is soaked with tears’ (Psalm: 6:6 Good News Bible). The good news is that God is there when we cry out to him – he wants us to be honest with him. What is more, he wants to show us how to navigate the things that cause us to worry.

In 1979 the singer Lena Martell took the song ‘One Day at a Time’ to the top of the charts. It included the words: ‘Lord help me today, show me the way/ One day at a time.’ When we’re worried, it can help to pray exactly that.

I heard of someone who would wake up each morning and ask Jesus ‘if we can do today’, with ‘we’ being the important word. The next day he would do the same thing and the next. A one-day contract with Jesus, if you like.

Worry can leave us feeling a bit lost – but Jesus assures us that God not only cares for us in such times but can also give us direction to help us find a way through the things that cause us concern.